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:) I've long held that a useful counterintelligence strategy is to weave real operations into fictional films, such that if someone catches on and tries to tel

:) I've long held that a useful counterintelligence strategy is to weave real operations into fictional films, such that if someone catches on and tries to tell people about it, the response is simply "you schizophrenic - that's the plot of Die Hard 4!" Slightly less conspiratorial version is that agents and clerks with knowledge of operations get drunk at the same bars as Hollywood script writers

hopelite 11mo ago
That is largely correct, even if not for that specific purpose/reason. Those people are largely self-discrediting, among other things.
Terr_ 11mo ago
> that's the plot of Die Hard 4 I must admit, the plausibility of corrupt government officials triggering a disaster to irreversibly steal bajillions of tax dollars hits a little differently today, 18 years later. Not just due to the dramatis personae in charge, or the existence of cryptocurrencies, but also the real-world overlap of the two.
ProllyInfamous 11mo ago
Right before Snowden, I met a "fiction" author whose DefCon presentation was about government attempts at management of conspiracy theorists. His SciFi writings were the technically-dense ramblings you'd expect from somebody who'd spent much of his early decades contracting for secretive government agencies. During both his speech and in the introduction to his book Mindgames, he mentions that most DoD-funded personnel (staff or contract) sign agreements which give Agency-censorship, even after employment ends. Richard suggests that a method to reduce overall censorship is to write "fiction" books that contain less than 90% truth. The secret, he maintains, is to not distinguish between truths and embellishments. ---- I listened to most of Richard's speech, some fifteen years ago, with my eyes rolling around in my head (yeah... sure... okay...). It wasn't until my IBEW apprenticeship, primarily working inside large data centers during the Snowden revelations, that I realized the orchestrated lies narrating our headlines. Don't carry the internet in your pocket with you everywhere; use cash; spend some unmonitored time reading real books purchased from actual stores; pet your cat for just one more minute. [*] Note: I belive Richard's surname was Thiele or Thieme, but cannot locate his book at the moment — he was an absolute nut, but 80% of his publications seem to have proven truthful to-date.
- dylan604 11mo ago
  > government attempts at management of conspiracy theorists. The Mel Gibson movie Conspiracy Theory goes into a version of this. In the conspiracy world, there's the trope on Merlin's magic wand was made from the wood of a holly tree and was used to cause confusion and mind control type of spells.
  - ProllyInfamous 11mo ago
    Thanks for tonight's movie recommendation (Braveheart was sick, I'll give Mel another chance!). >Merlin's holly wand The More You Know™ [0] [0] https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-is-the-significance-of-a-Pq4Q97LPSWayjFI3pAslKg https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-is-the-significance-of...
    - dylan604 11mo ago
      Oh please don’t think I was suggesting it. It’s just what the movie was about. It’s. It on me if it’s not your cup of tea. Brave heart it isn’t.
      - ProllyInfamous 11mo ago
        How had I never seen this? Mel Gibson and a red-headed stalkee Julia Roberts as co-leads!?! Patrick Stewart as government villain?!? My review after watching it last night (thanks again): definitely worth watching, but you'd be a nut to recommend this to anybody that has both feet on this planet. The first-half does a great job capturing what being a schizoid talkaholic feels like (both for self and others). The second-half is action packed with multiple mindfucks for the audience ("why does he have that picture?!" 3x). Not a good date movie, keep it for a personal tinfoil.popcorn movienight. Ensemble: 9/10 Mel: 5/10 plays crazy too well Julia: 10/10 wow no publishable notes Patrick: 8.5 strobelit flashbacks of Captain Kirk waterboarding The Passion Actor Synergy: 2/10 nobody seemed too thrilled with the screenplay Explosions: 10/10 guy knew what he was doing DAM Tinfoil: all the squarefeets Believability (1997): 2/10 Believability (2025): 8.5/10 Overall: 5.5/10 Worth watching, even if just certain sassy actress scenes. Julia Roberts explores all damsel emotions in this one.
squigz 11mo ago
It's not a conspiracy - this is why Stargate exists!
- bdamm 11mo ago
  Can you explain the link?
  - squigz 11mo ago
    It's the plot of an episode of SG-1 [1] A TV show comes out that is practically the Stargate program and instead of stopping its production, the Air Force lets it go on as a cover in case the Stargate program has a leak https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Wormhole_X-Treme!_(episode) https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Wormhole_X-Treme!_(episode)
- LargoLasskhyfv 11mo ago
  I'm wondering if you're aware of the (allegedly, implying it goes on(emphasis mine)) former existence of the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project_(U.S._Army_unit) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project_(U.S._Army_un... ?
  - squigz 11mo ago
    So not only did they make a scifi show to cover up any leaks, not only did they put another scifi show in the first one as an extra cover, they conducted psychic experiments as a further coverup?! There's clearly something here.
    - LargoLasskhyfv 11mo ago
      Intoning What are the odds? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Penny_for_Your_Thoughts_(The_Twilight_Zone) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Penny_for_Your_Thoughts_(The... Edit: Hm no, IMO the Sci-Fi shows came much later, and that Stargate thing with the psychics was just an offshoot of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MKUltra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MKUltra which came much earlier, maybe just overlapping from its end, fizzling out, to the early beginnigs of Stargate. In between, and related is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Monroe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Monroe and his institute.
bncndn0956 11mo ago
It's generally called as pressure release valve. Talk about something adnauseum that it becomes so commonplace that it doesn't evoke strong feelings at all.
nizbit 11mo ago
There is the CIA Publication Review board as described by author and former CIA analyst David McCloskey https://www.npr.org/2025/09/29/nx-s1-5442567/the-new-spy-thriller-the-persian-is-built-on-real-tradecraft https://www.npr.org/2025/09/29/nx-s1-5442567/the-new-spy-thr... Nothing jaw dropping but he surprised on what get through

hopelite 11mo ago

That is largely correct, even if not for that specific purpose/reason. Those people are largely self-discrediting, among other things.

Terr_ 11mo ago

> that's the plot of Die Hard 4 I must admit, the plausibility of corrupt government officials triggering a disaster to irreversibly steal bajillions of tax dollars hits a little differently today, 18 years later. Not just due to the dramatis personae in charge, or the existence of cryptocurrencies, but also the real-world overlap of the two.

ProllyInfamous 11mo ago

Right before Snowden, I met a "fiction" author whose DefCon presentation was about government attempts at management of conspiracy theorists. His SciFi writings were the technically-dense ramblings you'd expect from somebody who'd spent much of his early decades contracting for secretive government agencies. During both his speech and in the introduction to his book Mindgames, he mentions that most DoD-funded personnel (staff or contract) sign agreements which give Agency-censorship, even after employment ends. Richard suggests that a method to reduce overall censorship is to write "fiction" books that contain less than 90% truth. The secret, he maintains, is to not distinguish between truths and embellishments. ---- I listened to most of Richard's speech, some fifteen years ago, with my eyes rolling around in my head (yeah... sure... okay...). It wasn't until my IBEW apprenticeship, primarily working inside large data centers during the Snowden revelations, that I realized the orchestrated lies narrating our headlines. Don't carry the internet in your pocket with you everywhere; use cash; spend some unmonitored time reading real books purchased from actual stores; pet your cat for just one more minute. [*] Note: I belive Richard's surname was Thiele or Thieme, but cannot locate his book at the moment — he was an absolute nut, but 80% of his publications seem to have proven truthful to-date.

dylan604 11mo ago
> government attempts at management of conspiracy theorists. The Mel Gibson movie Conspiracy Theory goes into a version of this. In the conspiracy world, there's the trope on Merlin's magic wand was made from the wood of a holly tree and was used to cause confusion and mind control type of spells.
- ProllyInfamous 11mo ago
  Thanks for tonight's movie recommendation (Braveheart was sick, I'll give Mel another chance!). >Merlin's holly wand The More You Know™ [0] [0] https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-is-the-significance-of-a-Pq4Q97LPSWayjFI3pAslKg https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-is-the-significance-of...
  - dylan604 11mo ago
    Oh please don’t think I was suggesting it. It’s just what the movie was about. It’s. It on me if it’s not your cup of tea. Brave heart it isn’t.
    - ProllyInfamous 11mo ago
      How had I never seen this? Mel Gibson and a red-headed stalkee Julia Roberts as co-leads!?! Patrick Stewart as government villain?!? My review after watching it last night (thanks again): definitely worth watching, but you'd be a nut to recommend this to anybody that has both feet on this planet. The first-half does a great job capturing what being a schizoid talkaholic feels like (both for self and others). The second-half is action packed with multiple mindfucks for the audience ("why does he have that picture?!" 3x). Not a good date movie, keep it for a personal tinfoil.popcorn movienight. Ensemble: 9/10 Mel: 5/10 plays crazy too well Julia: 10/10 wow no publishable notes Patrick: 8.5 strobelit flashbacks of Captain Kirk waterboarding The Passion Actor Synergy: 2/10 nobody seemed too thrilled with the screenplay Explosions: 10/10 guy knew what he was doing DAM Tinfoil: all the squarefeets Believability (1997): 2/10 Believability (2025): 8.5/10 Overall: 5.5/10 Worth watching, even if just certain sassy actress scenes. Julia Roberts explores all damsel emotions in this one.

squigz 11mo ago

It's not a conspiracy - this is why Stargate exists!

bdamm 11mo ago
Can you explain the link?
- squigz 11mo ago
  It's the plot of an episode of SG-1 [1] A TV show comes out that is practically the Stargate program and instead of stopping its production, the Air Force lets it go on as a cover in case the Stargate program has a leak https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Wormhole_X-Treme!_(episode) https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Wormhole_X-Treme!_(episode)
LargoLasskhyfv 11mo ago
I'm wondering if you're aware of the (allegedly, implying it goes on(emphasis mine)) former existence of the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project_(U.S._Army_unit) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project_(U.S._Army_un... ?
- squigz 11mo ago
  So not only did they make a scifi show to cover up any leaks, not only did they put another scifi show in the first one as an extra cover, they conducted psychic experiments as a further coverup?! There's clearly something here.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 11mo ago
    Intoning What are the odds? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Penny_for_Your_Thoughts_(The_Twilight_Zone) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Penny_for_Your_Thoughts_(The... Edit: Hm no, IMO the Sci-Fi shows came much later, and that Stargate thing with the psychics was just an offshoot of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MKUltra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MKUltra which came much earlier, maybe just overlapping from its end, fizzling out, to the early beginnigs of Stargate. In between, and related is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Monroe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Monroe and his institute.

bncndn0956 11mo ago

It's generally called as pressure release valve. Talk about something adnauseum that it becomes so commonplace that it doesn't evoke strong feelings at all.

nizbit 11mo ago

There is the CIA Publication Review board as described by author and former CIA analyst David McCloskey https://www.npr.org/2025/09/29/nx-s1-5442567/the-new-spy-thriller-the-persian-is-built-on-real-tradecraft https://www.npr.org/2025/09/29/nx-s1-5442567/the-new-spy-thr... Nothing jaw dropping but he surprised on what get through